LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Country before party

The United States had an unemployment rate of nearly 10 percent when President Obama first took office. He wanted to start an infrastructure program that would create desperately needed jobs in the construction industry. The Republicans in office at that time fought him — some because they just did not want to spend the money and add to the national debt and some because they simply would do whatever it took to hinder his presidency.

Eight years later, the United States has an unemployment rate of about 4.7 percent and many economists feel we are at full employment. The Jan. 22 Democrat-Gazette stated that many contractors in Texas are turning down jobs because they cannot find enough workers to complete the work.

Our new president has promised to build a wall to keep out undocumented workers. Considering that we have such a lack of construction workers, it would appear he will very likely have to use undocumented workers to build a wall to keep out undocumented workers. It looks like we have the makings of an actual Catch 22. It would be funny if it were not so serious.

My bigger concern is that our new president is putting the United States’ reputation at great risk. We have, over the past 70 years and after long and very difficult negotiations, made many agreements with other nations. They have covered many different subjects such as defense, economics and the environment. Now our new president is threatening to scrap many of these agreements. He says, in many cases, it is to “get a better deal.” In so doing, he is destroying the reputation our country has earned ever since World War II. In the future, nations negotiating with us will have every right to say that we are not a reliable partner. They can say that the United States can change administrations every four years and, “Just look what your country did back in 2017. We cannot depend on the U.S. to honor any agreement it makes beyond the current administration.”

My hope and my prayer is that our representatives and our senators will find the political courage to place their concerns for their fellow human beings and the reputation of the United States of America before their personal political ambitions and their allegiance to their party leaders.

Ronald Olson Bella Vista

Project brings tears

For those readers who saw the article in the Feb. 11 issue of the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette about the Storybook Project, please note that the group welcomes donations which can be sent to The Storybook Project of Arkansas, P.O. Box 982, Cherokee Village AR 72725.

The donations are tax deductible. The group selects books that are age appropriate and then visits prisons in Arkansas and asks prisoners who have children or grandchildren if they would like to be recorded reading the book for that child. Once the recording is completed, the group mails a CD of the recording along with the book to that child.

The prisoners’ responses to what the group is doing brought tears to my eyes.

Xyta Lucas Bella vista